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This is a churchy post. And there's probably too much context for me to give anyone who's not familiar with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Be ye warned.

Back in January our ward boundaries were rearranged, and we became a brand new ward. The boundaries consist of two separate neighborhoods rather than one continuous area. I knew my immediate subdivision because we had been together in the previous ward, but half the ward was unfamiliar. And we had just been in our previous ward for 18 months or so, in a new state with no family around, so it was another adjustment period.
For a couple of months I had no calling in the new ward, so I felt a little lost. I had never felt that way before in a ward, but I really wanted some sort of responsibility.
As is often the case, I think they were struggling to get enough teachers called to the primary. By the time I was called in for an interview a couple months after the ward formed, I had a pretty strong sense that a pri…

The other night our doorbell rang. We opened it to see a woman we don't know. She said, "I was asked to give this to you," and handed Katie an envelope and left. We closed the door, opened the envelope, and...

... saw a $500 Walmart gift card.

Our first thought was, this has to be a mistake. This is the time of year when people look to help those in need. We assumed someone, or a group of someones, had collected this money and sent someone to deliver it. It seemed like this person had probably just knocked on the wrong door. But she was gone, and there was nothing on the card to indicate who had sent it. And while I'm sure my kids don't always look super neat and comely, they are generally well cared for.

I called the ward relief society president, who would likely coordinate any large-scale donations of that kind if it were done by church members. She had no idea what the deal was.

So now we are trying to figure out how to use it. I think we'll hold on to it…

I'm going to combine a couple different thoughts complaints here into one post about pet peeves.

First is the less egregious complaint, which is that Samuel has been learning how to whistle lately. And it's really getting on my nerves. He's just getting to the point where he can start to hit a few different notes, and it's pretty constant every evening and all weekend long. Sometimes I'm about to lie down to sleep and I hear the whistles drifting up through the vent, and I cringe. I can't say exactly why it's so irritating, but it is. I don't want to discourage him, though, so I'm not going to say anything.

Now on to the much more serious complaint. I don't think of myself as a "pet peeves" person, but I guess this is #1 on my list. It's simply this: saying you'll do something and not doing it.

There are so many examples of this. I depend on some people at work for a weekly task, and I have told them multiple times that I need…

I feel like Samuel is a good kid to ease into the whole parenting teenagers thing. He's responsible and relatively level-headed. He has a desire to be obedient and is fiercely defensive of his family. And he recently switched from taekwondo to krav maga, so that defense is also literal.

He's not fond of being photographed right now, however, so you get to see him with his siblings. Happy birthday, Samuel. I honestly could not hope for a better son.

Last week I had the arthroscopic knee surgery that I had wanted to get for a while. It turns out I'm really close to my out-of-pocket insurance max this year, so the $10k operation should cost no more than $300. So it made sense.

It was interesting. I went to the hospital, they shaved part of my leg (a first for me), and then I was in and out within about an hour. I didn't get to talk to the doctor, so I'll have to wait for the follow-up next week to see what he has to say about how much damage there was.

The recovery has been... well, I have nothing to compare it to. I used crutches off and on for the first two days or so, but I was allowed to put weight on it even right after the surgery. It was just removing some damaged cartilage from the knee cap, rather than repairing a tendon or something major. That being said, it's been really swollen and pretty uncomfortable. Not much pain, though, and I decid…

Sometimes it's fun to see little clues around in your daily life and try to paint a picture with them, Sherlock Holmes style. I had one such experience on Saturday while I was out for a run.

I often see beer cans or liquor bottles on the side of the road, and this day was no exception. There was the usual assortment of evidence of alcoholism. But among the brown weeds and grass, something red caught my eye. As I ran past, I could just make out what appeared to be lacy underwear. So I figured someone had an exciting night.

And I continued on. Then, about 2/3 of a mile further down the road, I saw what was unmistakably a pregnancy test. Ah, the plot thickens. That exciting night has consequences.

That was all for now. But in 9 months I'm going to make sure to run down the same road and see if there are any discarded diapers.